The Order
by ellenscult
Summary: The order is coming. Casey knows he has to be ready this time. Warning: contains *cough*Character Death*cough*, nudity and m/m graphic sex. If this is distasteful to you or illegal in your area, don't read.
1. Chapter 1

The order is coming, Casey knows. It's only a matter of time before General Beckman orders him to kill Chuck, and Casey very much doubts the new Intersect will blow up just in the nick of time. So he makes preparations, gets ready, flushes out his head gear and brings his A-game to the table.

Over his headphones, he hears Chuck moving around the kitchen. From the clink of a knife against a jar, the rustle of a wrapper, the sound of the fridge door opening and closing, Casey knows he's making a sandwich. One of his favourite pastimes; something that requires his full attention.

Chuck doesn't hear Casey enter through the Morgan Door, doesn't hear him move down the hallway. He doesn't see Casey take a quick look around the corner because he's putting the butter back in the fridge. Casey is right behind him before he has chance to turn around, the needle going right through his thin trousers and into his buttock. He has time to yelp, then Casey is catching him for the very last time as he falls, lowering him gently to the kitchen floor.

Casey leaves the apartment the same way he entered, just as Ellie and Awesome walk in through the front door. Ellie does CPR while Awesome calls for an ambulance. Casey, a good neighbour to the last, comes over at the sound of the siren and drives Awesome to the hospital. Ellie is still doing CPR on Chuck in the ER when they arrive. It's forty minutes later that Awesome leads her away to let the attending doctor write down the time of death.

Ellie cries for a whole day.

The autopsy report says that Chuck died from Sudden Adult Death Syndrome. His heart simply stopped, probably weakened by a bout of flu he had a year ago.

The funeral is two days later. Sarah wears black, cries at the appropriate moment, and corners Casey after the service.

'Did you get the order? Was it you?' She's pale, trembling with the strain of holding herself together.

Casey shakes his head.

'I'd have used a gun. You saw the autopsy report. All the time we spent keeping the bad guys from shooting him, we couldn't protect him from his own body.' He sighs. 'Take some time off, Walker.'

'Are you?'

He nods.

Casey spends a little while removing the bugs he placed in the Bartowski's apartment, but lets the agencies 'sanitize' the Buy More. He only goes back in there to hand in his resignation because he's learned not to underestimate nerds. If he vanishes without a trace, they might just start digging into his background.

He packs up the apartment, takes some clothes, his bonsai, a couple of cases of weapons. The NSA clears out the rest of the apartment and, with the CIA, empties the secret spy base underneath Orange Orange. Twelve hours after the funeral, 'John Casey' is officially wrapped up.

He drives away from that little apartment complex without anyone noticing that he's gone, and he wonders how long it'll take before Ellie realises he's no longer around. He's pretty sure that Morgan will let her know Casey was so shocked by Chuck's untimely death that he decided to do some travelling, get more out of life than could be had selling appliances at the Buy More. It's a sign of how much being around Chuck has changed him that Casey hopes, very briefly, that Morgan gets out of the Buy More too. The little bearded freak will have to do all the living for the both of them now.

Casey stops his car at a little motel twenty miles down the road. He's already checked in under the name Guntersen, so he parks his car round the back where it won't be seen from the road, double-checks that the GPS tracker is turned off, and goes to his room where he sits on the bed and reads.

It's dark outside by the time Chuck wakes up.


	2. Chapter 2

'What... Casey?' He struggles to talk, dry-mouthed and cotton-tongued.

Sitting beside him on the bed, Casey puts down his book and picks up a glass of water that's been sitting on the night-stand.

'Here, drink this.'

His hands are gentle as they help Chuck to raise his head, tip the glass carefully at his lips, letting the young man take sips until the glass is empty.

'Don't try to sit up yet. You've been out for a while.'

Chuck watches him with big, dark eyes. The shadows beneath them are so dark the skin looks bruised.

'How long?' he asks.

Casey raises an eyebrow.

'How long was I out?'

'Three days,' Casey says quietly. There's no trace of his habitual sarcasm in his tone.

'Ellie!' Chuck tries to sit up, but Casey places one large hand on his shoulder, easily pinning him down.

'I said not to sit up yet, genius.' The sarcasm is back.

Chuck glares at him. 'What happened?' The look on Casey's face tells him he's not going to like the answer.

'You died. Your heart was weakened by a virus and it just gave out. According to the autopsy report, anyhow. I'd have let you wake up sooner, but I thought it'd be better to get the funeral out of the way first.'

'Oh, no, no, no, you can't do this! I have to go to Ellie. And Morgan! How could you do this to them? To me?'

Casey lets his mask slip for just a second, and the pain Chuck sees in the agent's face silences him.

'Because the alternative would have been to kill you for real.'

Casey takes his hand away, and Chuck misses its warmth. 'What do you mean?'

'You remember when I said life doesn't always work out how you want it to?'

Chuck nods. 'Yeah, you told me not to get my hopes up. Make the most of it. I thought you were just being your usual cheery self.'

'The evening Intersect Two went live, I got the order.' When Chuck looks confused, Casey explains. 'The kill order. From Beckman and Graham. They couldn't let you keep on walking around with all their secrets in your head.'

'They were never going to take them out of me, were they?'

Casey hates the despair in Chuck's voice, hates that he put it there.

'No.'

'But it exploded.'

Casey nods. 'I was in your apartment when Sarah told you. If she'd knocked at the door ten seconds later, you'd have been dead.'

Chuck gives him such a wounded look that Casey's heart breaks.

'I couldn't do it,' he admits gruffly, and is rewarded with a tentative smile. 'I should have shot you already by the time Sarah arrived. I knew the General would give the order again once they'd built another Intersect. If I refused, they'd send in another agent to do the job, and they'd have orders to kill me too. So I faked your death in such a way they'd have no reason to think you might still be alive, no reason to check up on me.'

Soberly, Chuck asks, 'How did you do it?'

'I drugged you. It slowed down your body so much that you appeared dead.'

'And the autopsy?'

'The government wasn't about to let a civilian hospital cut you up in case someone got hold of your brain.'

'But aren't they going to want one to find out how I died?'

'They already did one and found out. At least, that's what they think. I switched your body for someone who looked like you.'

'You killed someone just because he looked like me?'

Casey finds he's upset at how horrified Chuck sounds. 'No, you moron! The guy died of natural causes a couple months back. I just kept the body in case it came in handy.'

'Because that's not weird and creepy,' Chuck says, and frowns. 'So what happens now? Does Sarah know?'

Casey shakes his head. 'No. I couldn't risk her telling someone.'

Chuck swallows, closes his eyes. 'Everyone thinks I'm dead. I have no-one left.'

Casey puts his hand back on Chuck's shoulder as he answers, 'That's not quite true. You've got me.'


	3. Chapter 3

He has to help Chuck up to use the bathroom, steadying him when he sways, light-headed. 'Careful, Bartowski.'

'I suppose you wouldn't want to go to all the trouble of faking my death only to have me break my skull on the sink,' Chuck says drily.

Casey grunts, but keeps a firm hold of Chuck until he's safely ensconced on the toilet. He turns his back while Chuck does his business, but refuses to leave the room, and Chuck is desperate enough that he pees anyway. And when Chuck's finished and tells Casey he really needs a shower, he strips off first before helping the young man to undress, ignoring the shocked looks and squeaks of protest which are all Chuck is currently able to deliver.

'If you can't stand up without help, how do you think you're going to shower?' he points out, exasperated. He ignores Chuck's blush, although it's interesting to see just how far down his chest it goes, and hauls the young man into the shower.

Three days in a drug-induced coma have taken pounds off Chuck's already too-thin frame, and Casey resolves to feed him up. He can practically count Chuck's ribs as he washes them, keeping one arm wrapped around his chest while the other hand rubs a soapy cloth briskly over Chuck's pale skin.

'I can wash myself, Casey!' Chuck's tone veers towards the desperate as Casey's hand moves lower, but he's held firmly against the solid wall of muscle that is the older man's chest, and then all he can do is hang onto the arm supporting him as that hand wipes the cloth carefully but firmly over his penis and scrotum. Then Casey turns him around to face him, holding him chest to chest, as close as a lover, so that he can wash Chuck's hair and back.

By the time he's finished, Chuck has passed through shock and embarrassment into a state of mortification so severe he doesn't think he'll ever stop blushing. He's just glad that the drugs appear to be keeping some bits of him asleep for longer; he's sure that otherwise the effect of having hands - any hands - touching him so intimately would have provoked a response. And he's beyond grateful for Casey's silent reserve, his professional, impersonal attitude, his clear lack of anything approaching sexual interest in Chuck.

Casey wraps Chuck in a scratchy motel towel and carries him back to bed. He leaves Chuck alone to dry himself off, going back into the bathroom to dry himself off and pick up their clothes from the floor. When he returns, Chuck is back under the covers with the thin blanket pulled up to his chest. He looks cold, exhausted.

'Here.' Casey fishes a t-shirt and a pair of boxer shorts out of his suitcase. 'Put these on.'

Chuck does as he's told, and by the time the t-shirt is over his head, Casey has dressed in black jeans and a white t-shirt. He sits on the edge of the bed to lace up his shoes.

'You're leaving?' Chuck asks, and Casey hears panic at the edge of his voice.

'Just to go next door, get you something to eat,' he replies, putting as much reassurance into his tone as he knows how. 'There's a burger place. I'll be back in five minutes.'

'How do you know I'll still be here?' Chuck challenges, and Casey smiles, pleased he's keeping it together.

'Five minutes, Bartowski.'

He leaves, hearing the lock snick shut behind him, crosses the parking lot knowing that Chuck is climbing out of bed and looking for the phone. The same phone which is in the trunk of his car right now.

He's back inside four minutes.

It's only later, after he's eaten, after Casey has switched the light out and climbed into bed with him, that Chuck thinks to ask why.

'Why what?' Casey rumbles, turning onto his side.

'Why didn't you just shoot me? Then you could go back to being a bad-ass government assassin, fly stealth planes, travel the world and kill the bad guys.'

Casey scowls, discomforted. In the light that filters in around the edges of the curtains, he can just make out the young man, eyes huge black pools in that pale face. 'Because,' he rumbles.

He doesn't say, 'Because you're what I signed up to protect. Because you know this game turns the best of us into monsters, and you refuse to become one yourself. Because you know the worst about me, but you won't believe that's all I am. Because you remind me of what it is to be whole and human. Because I'd rather shoot myself than you.' But somehow, Chuck seems to hear that anyway, his mouth curving into his first real smile since he's woken up.

'Okay,' he says softly. 'Because, it is.' And he turns on his side, too, facing away from Casey in a bed which is really too small for two tall men, and in the morning, when Casey wakes, it is to find Chuck using his chest for a pillow, and his arms around the young man's thin frame, keeping him close, keeping him safe.


	4. Chapter 4

Casey holds Chuck while he sleeps, studying the new lines that have started to appear on his face. He's relieved that the shadows under Chuck's eyes no longer look like bruises. Chuck shifts, nuzzling into Casey's shoulder, then stills again, seemingly reassured by the big man's scent. One of Chuck's long legs rests against Casey's groin, making him painfully aware of his morning erection. He wills it to subside before Chuck wakes up, but his luck isn't that good.

Chuck's eyelids flutter open and he looks straight into Casey's piercingly blue eyes. In that waking moment he is unguarded, vulnerable. Casey feels as though he can see into the young man's soul. Then Chuck blinks and the spell is broken.

'Morning,' he rumbles, praying Chuck won't notice what he's sprawled across.

'Morning,' Chuck replies automatically. 'Uh... You're holding me.' He has a talent for stating the obvious.

'You're the one using me as your pillow,' Casey retorts. He still hasn't let go.

Chuck blushes, shifts again, then stills with a sharp intake of breath.

Casey freezes. Pressed against his hip is the unmistakeable confirmation that Chuck is in a state identical to his own.

After a pause, Chuck speaks, his eyes resolutely focussed somewhere around the level of Casey's chin. 'Well, this is awkward.'

Casey grunts his assent and watches the flush deepen along Chuck's cheekbones. Then he sighs and loosens his hold.

'You have to move before I can get up,' he says and is only a little annoyed by the smirk that passes across Chuck's face. 'Move it, Bartowski,' he snaps and is more annoyed when Chuck does as he says.

Casey pushes himself out of bed and goes to use the bathroom. When he comes out, he begins his morning exercise routine.

Chuck pretends disinterest, then gives it up in favour of outright gawping as Casey runs through several sets of sit-ups, push-ups and crunches in reps of thirty. When Casey has finished, Chuck shakes his head in amazement.

'How do you do that?' he asks, impressed.

Casey shrugs. 'Practise.' He showers and dresses in black jeans and a black t-shirt as Chuck manages to shower himself. Seemingly from nowhere he produces cereal and cold milk and makes Chuck eat when he's dressed too. The clothes are like his old ones, only new.

'Your sister might have noticed if some of your clothes went missing,' Casey explains, although Chuck doesn't ask him to. He ignores the hangdog expression and the cloud of gloom which Chuck gathers to himself, instead taking the room's one wooden chair and standing it on newspaper which he has laid across the floor.

'Sit.'

'Why? What are you going to do now?' Chuck's face sets into his stubborn expression, chin jutting, brows a little furrowed, mouth narrowing ever so slightly. Casey is tempted just to order him to sit on the damn chair, but he's known Chuck for long enough now to realise that way is counterproductive.

'If I'm going to keep you out of the hands of our government, I need to make you look different. The easiest way for me to do that is to change your hair. Cut, colour, style. Are you okay with that, Bartowski, or should I just buy you a wig and call you Shirley?' He stands patiently beside the chair, one hand resting on its square-framed back.

Chuck sits on the chair.

'So where are we going?' he asks as Casey begins to cut those thick dark curls away from around his neck. 'Are you going to disguise yourself? How are we doing this?'

Casey growls. 'Unless you want me to cut your ears off too, keep your head still.' Once he's finished with the tricky bits, he starts talking again.

'I have roughly eight months of leave accumulated by now. I'm going to take as much of it as I can before I hand in my resignation. They won't like it, so I'm going to need to make them believe I've lost my edge, lost my taste for the life. They need to believe I'm burned out, but not a danger to them. That's where you come in.'

'Me?' Chuck asks, his voice rising. 'You can't just hide me in your attic?'

'I have a background prepared for you. We're heading to Wyoming, go see some mountains and horses. You're a stable-hand at a ranch owned by an old friend of mine. He owes me a favour, so he's had you on his payroll for six months now.'

'How long have you been planning this?' He looks betrayed.

'A while,' Casey admits, and puts down the scissors. He combs through what's left of Chuck's hair, sending loose strands floating down onto the towel around Chuck's shoulders and the newspaper on the floor. 'There, that's better,' he says gruffly, hiding how sad it makes him to see Chuck's beautiful unruly hair tamed. 'Now for the dye.'

Chuck sits still as Casey applies bleach, being careful not to let it drip down his forehead or neck.

'What then?' Chuck asks once his eyes have stopped watering from the chemical haze.

Casey takes a deep breath. This is where his plan could all still fall apart.

'I meet you, we fall in love, and I tell Beckman that I quit.'

Chuck stares at him for so long that he can feel his jaw clenching, his shoulders tensing up. Then Chuck speaks.

'Okay.'

Casey nods once, and gets back to the job of making Chuck into a new man.


	5. Chapter 5

Six months go by. Six long months in which Chuck learns an awful lot about horses, largely doesn't flash on anybody or anything, and builds some lean, wiry muscles to go with his newfound tan. Casey keeps Chuck's hair short, a light brown, and calls him Pete. Chuck's not keen on the name, but he's learned to answer to it pretty well. He's also learned to answer to some of the other things that Casey calls him in the middle of the night, and he's fairly sure his favourite is 'God'.

The first time they make love, it's three months after Chuck's funeral.

Until now, the plan has gone pretty smoothly. Casey drops Chuck off at the ranch and hides out for a week while Chuck establishes his cover. Then he breezes into town to visit his ranch-owning friend, get a little R&R, and ends up giving Chuck a lift back from a local bar one night fairly soon thereafter.

The other ranch hands are remarkably tolerant of the fact that Chuck ends up spending half his nights in Casey's bed instead of in the bunkhouse, and Chuck rapidly gets so used to sleeping beside that solid presence that he sleeps badly when he's on his own. It no longer bothers him that he invariably wakes up sprawled over the older man, whose arms are so strong and make him feel so safe. But it's only when they actually finally make love that Chuck realises just how much he cares for the man who has given up his career to save Chuck's life.

Three months in, the year is turning, frosts lying heavier on the ground each morning as Chuck goes out to the stables to begin mucking out stalls. And the nights are drawing in, leaving Chuck and Casey with an expanse of evening to fill. Neither of them are too sure how. There's no computer, no Nintendo Wii, no Gameboy, no Playstation 3, no X-Box to fill in the time with, and Chuck finds his desire to play those games fading from a compulsion to an ache, to a fond memory of happy days.

Casey feels much the same way about the lack of missions to prepare for and execute, the weapons to clean and death to deal and defy. He feels rootless, which surprises him, and a little restless, which doesn't. In fact, he feels like the burn-out he's supposed to be, and sometimes it makes him a little snappy.

After one such bout of Mister Grumpy, in which Chuck has done his best to try to cheer him up, Chuck finally snaps.

'You!'

His tone is so sharp that Casey is surprised into stopping his pacing. For the first time in a month, he takes his first really good look at the younger man.

Chuck stands up, eyes flashing, jaw clenched. 'You stole my life! Because of you I can never see my sister again. I won't ever know how Morgan's doing with Anna, or even if he got to play the latest Call of Duty yet! Yeah, I had a pretty crappy job, but it could have been much worse. Oh, wait - it_was_worse! Thanks to you and Sarah and Bryce and the stupid government's stupid secrets! You know what? I was grateful that you saved my life. Really. But it was your plan, your choice, and if all you're going to do is bitch and complain at me now, you might as well just shoot me and go back to work.'

He stares at Casey, anger staining his tanned cheeks with a dull red. His chest heaves as he takes a deep breath. 'I never asked you to save me,' he adds, quieter. 'I never asked you to give up your life for me.'

It's as though something has crumbled inside Casey's chest, a wall of ice that he didn't even know was surrounding his heart, keeping him from breathing. He strides over to Chuck, two steps that cover a distance far greater than the physical. Standing just inches away, he takes a deep breath of his own, and it feels like his first deep breath in forever.

'I couldn't kill you,' he says, and for the first time there's no shadow of guilt attached to the statement. 'I always catch you when you fall.'

Chuck looks into those incredible blue eyes, and later he can't say who leans in, but he and Casey are kissing, and it's not soft, but it is astoundingly gentle, and then those big, strong arms are wrapped around him, holding him, and Chuck realises that he's already fallen, a long time ago, and Casey, true to his word, has caught him.

There is no storybook melting away of clothes. Instead, t-shirts are pulled awkwardly over heads, catching ears and ruffling hair in the process. Jeans, once buttons have been fumbled open, are pushed down only to catch on boots, whose laces inexplicably develop knots. But once all that has been dealt with, socks and underpants are quickly and easily shed, leaving the two men laid diagonally across Casey's double bed, kissing as though the world is about to end.

They press chest to chest, hip to hip, long muscled legs tangled together, arms holding close, closer, hands stroking and pulling their bodies even more tightly together until Casey rolls them so that he's on top, and when he tries to take some of his weight on his elbows, Chuck makes an 'Mmph!' of protest and tugs him back down.

Their hips move, thrusting against each other, and Casey manages to stop kissing Chuck for just long enough to say, 'I want you.'

Chuck is so caught up and carried away by the depth of his emotions, of his need for this man, this man right here who wants him and needs him just as much, that he simply nods and reclaims Casey's lips, not thinking about the logistics, or that, when it comes to being fucked, he's a virgin.

Casey stretches out one long arm and manages to find and open the drawer of the bedside table. In it are a supply of condoms and a half-finished tube of lubricant which he has been using while masturbating so as to keep up the illusion of his relationship with 'Pete'.

It takes two hands to open the packet and sheath himself in rubber, but while he's pulled back a little, Chuck keeps on kissing him, hands roaming over his chest and back, his hips, buttocks, biceps. He runs his fingers through Casey's hair, kept shorter now that he's not keeping up a civilian cover at the Buy More, and learns by touch the curve of Casey's ears, the jut of his high cheekbones and the perfection of that jaw, chiselled by Michaelangelo himself.

Then Casey has the tube open and manages to squirt some onto his fingers, those blunt-tipped, calloused, strong fingers which are at this moment sliding between Chuck's legs, rubbing against his opening, circling and pushing. For a split second Chuck panics, but then Casey bites his lip and thrusts his tongue deep inside his mouth as he pushes the tip of one finger inside. As he kisses Chuck with single-minded intensity, that finger pauses, slides a little deeper, then a little deeper still, and Chuck whimpers at the feel of its welcome intrusion.

Casey moves his hand slowly in and out of Chuck's body, breaking off the kiss to rest his forehead against the young man's and ask, 'You okay?'

For an answer, Chuck cants his hips upwards, gasping as Casey's finger slides all the way in. 'Please,' he breathes, and he's not sure what he's asking for, but he knows that if Casey stops right now, stops what he's doing, Chuck will expire on the spot.

'Please.'

The word has an electric effect on Casey, making his penis jump and harden to the point it's almost painful. He pulls his hand back and on the next thrust he slides in a second finger, causing Chuck to cry out and pant. Slowly he fucks Chuck with his hand, taking the time to help Chuck's body adjust although the sweat is standing out on his forehead with the effort of holding back. He is rewarded when, curling his fingers a little, Chuck lurches underneath him.

'Fuck!'

Casey grins and removes his hand. Quickly he squirts more lube into his hand and strokes himself, coating his penis from root to tip, then positions himself between Chuck's legs.

'Ready?' he asks, and Chuck nods, takes a deep breath.

Casey pushes forward into that tight heat as slowly as he can. Chuck whimpers again, panting quickly until Casey is seated all the way inside him and pauses. Chuck's breathing slows.

'Fuck me, Casey,' he says, looking up at the older man with eyes full of need and desire and something deeper that Casey doesn't care to think about right now. 'I want you.'

So Casey does, his hips pulling back only to thrust forwards again. He covers Chuck's mouth with his own and can't tell which one of them is making those soft, throaty noises, which one of them is grunting, which one of them is calling out a wordless prayer, but he knows when his thrusts find Chuck's prostate, punishing that sweet spot until Chuck clenches hard around him, eyes screwed shut as he comes, pulsing between them. It is enough to push Casey over into his own blinding orgasm and he stills, his body pumping wave after wave of cum into the condom.

At last, when he can breathe again and his vision has returned to normal, Casey reaches down, takes hold of himself to keep the condom in place and withdraws. Chuck grunts a little, and Casey watches him anxiously.

'You all right?'

Chuck grins, looking a little dazed and endearingly goofy. 'Hell, yeah. How about you, big guy?'

Casey suspects that his expression is somewhat similar. 'Damn straight.' He kisses Chuck gently, then rolls off him and goes to dispose of the condom. He walks into the bathroom on unsteady legs and wets a cloth, wiping himself off, then washes his hands. Rinsing the cloth out, he returns to find Chuck still sprawled bonelessly across the bed.

'Here.' He tosses the cloth onto Chuck's belly, provoking a yelp of protest. 'Clean yourself up, or you'll end up pulling out hairs.'

Chuck winces and does as he's told. Casey sits beside him, watching, then takes the cloth off him when he's finished.

'Spread your legs,' he says gruffly. 'You're going to be sore.'

'I think I already worked that one out,' Chuck admits, but he spreads his legs and lets Casey wipe the cool cloth over his opening. When Casey gets up to drop the cloth back in the sink, Chuck puts a hand on his thigh, stopping him. 'It was worth it. You're worth it.'

Casey doesn't realise until he looks in the mirror that his cheeks are damp.

After that, Chuck doesn't bother sleeping in the bunkhouse any more. He spends his nights with Casey, whether or not they end up making love, and the days turn into weeks, which turn into months, and then it is Christmas. They spend it as a welcome part of the family at the ranch, both of them feeling easier and happier than they've known in years. It's clear to everyone that the two men care deeply for each other, and when the mistletoe gets passed around the room, they kiss in public for the first time to a chorus of whistles and cheers.


	6. Chapter 6

It's New Year when Casey gets a call on his cell phone.

'We have a situation. We need you to come back.' It is General Beckman, and Casey feels his stomach tightening.

'I still have another two months of leave,' he points out, keeping his voice reasonable.

'A car will be with you inside twelve hours.'

He doesn't hesitate. 'No.'

There is a pause, before Beckman says, 'Is there a problem, Major?'

'I said no. I'm not coming back.'

'That wasn't a request.'

Casey nods, although he knows she can't see him, takes a deep breath.

'I quit.'

There is another pause. 'I see.'

He closes the phone.

It's only six hours later that a helicopter lands in the lower pasture, sinking half-way up its runners in snow. Casey and Chuck are playing cards in the bunkhouse with a couple of the other ranch hands, but at the sound of the helicopter they stand, look at each other and, without saying a word, run up to the house.

Casey has time to grab a pistol, check it and tell Chuck to keep behind him before footsteps stop outside Casey's door. Quickly he tucks the gun into his waistband, somewhat reassured by its weight at the small of his back. Then the door opens and General Beckman walks in.

She's smaller in person than Chuck had thought, but her sharp eyes miss nothing as they take in the room.

'Major.'

Casey salutes. 'General.'

She stares past him at Chuck, frowning. 'Ah. I see.'

Casey tilts his head, puzzled.

'I take it you're Peter Kaminsky?'

Chuck nods. 'Yes ma'am,' he says, making his voice as low and un-Chuck-like as possible.

'Did Major Casey ever tell you who you resemble?'

'Not that I recall,' he admits. 'Why?'

Beckman sighs. 'Would you mind waiting downstairs? I need to speak with the Major.'

Chuck leaves the room, nearly hyperventilating as he walks right past the General.

'I hadn't realised just how compromised you were by Charles Bartowski,' she says, and her tone is unusually soft.

'I'm not sure I follow you, General,' Casey says, face and voice giving nothing away.

'I realise your boyfriend is, what, a couple of inches taller? And he's clearly four or five years older, but to all intents and purposes you appear to have found yourself Chuck's double.' She takes a step forwards. 'Major, that situation was difficult for everyone concerned, but it wasn't your fault that he died. I knew I should have brought you in for assessment rather than letting you take indefinite leave.'

'I take it you've run a background check on Pete?' Casey asks.

'Of course. We didn't find anything more than a couple of speeding tickets from when he was a teenager. I have to say, he looks a little different in his DMV photo.'

Casey snorts. 'Don't we all?'

She lets herself smile, just a little, before her face falls back into its usual severe expression. 'Major, we really do need you.'

Casey shakes his head. 'Not this time, General. I've defended this country for over half my life without question. I've helped keep its inhabitants safe so they can have their houses and kids and white picket fences. I've done things no one should ever have to, just so that ordinary people can sleep at night. When Chuck died, I realised I've lost my taste for it, my edge. I thought I'd be dead years ago, but I'm not, and now I have someone in my life, someone to care about.' He sighs. 'Don't make me come back, General. I can't do it.'

The General looks long and hard at Major John Casey. She sees the grey creeping in at his temples, the way in which, in some indefinable way, he looks freer, more at ease than she's ever seen him before. In all the years she's known him, which, yes, is probably half his life, he has never said no to her, to duty. He's never said 'enough' or asked for something for himself. She looks around the room, which is plain, devoid of high-tech equipment, and she sees his two bonsai trees, clearly still lovingly cared for, and she makes her decision.

'All right, John. I'll get someone to send through the paperwork. Enjoy your retirement.'

Downstairs in the kitchen, Chuck leans back against the counter, sipping from a mug of coffee with what he hopes is casual detatchment. The two men in suits standing beside the back door are clearly armed, though, and are making his attempt somewhat more difficult by staring at him. The silence is strained, painful, and Chuck jumps when General Beckman walks in.

She regards him much as he imagines she'd regard a novel species of insect that crossed her path.

'Remarkable,' she murmurs, then nods sharply to the two men. They go outside, and Chuck starts to relax, but the General crosses to stand in front of him and holds out her hand. Dumbly, Chuck takes it and shakes the hand of the woman who, for a time, controlled his world.

'Thank you,' she says, and there's a look in her eyes which Chuck only identifies as pride after she's gone, closing the back door behind her.

Casey is standing in the other doorway watching him. A weight has been lifted from his shoulders and he looks years younger. He smiles, a large, open, honest smile that Chuck finds irresistable.

Later, in bed, he watches Casey sleep. Chuck doesn't have the heart to tell him that the General knew. She knew, and she let them live anyway. 'Thank you,' he murmurs, and lays his head on his lover's strong shoulder, and sleeps.


	7. Epilogue

A couple of years later, Chuck and Casey are back in California. General Beckman has asked Casey to train up a young field agent, and Casey finds he is unable to say no, especially as the General tells him he can bring 'Pete' along too.

He meets the agent at her workplace; she has kept up her pre-NSA job as for some reason it appears to be an excellent cover.

Before he can say more than hello, someone barrels into him, and quick as blinking, he has them in an armlock.

'Ow! Ow, ow, ow! You can let go now, Casey,' Morgan wheezes, and with a hint of a smile Casey does so.

'Grimes. You still here?'

'Yeah, man. I quit for six months, but I had to come back to my Anna, you know? She needs me.' The look Morgan gives his wife is full of pride.

'Ms Wu,' Casey nods in respect, one professional to another.

'Always a pleasure,' Anna purrs. 'I'll be in the home theatre room in five minutes.'

Morgan watches her sashay through the DVD section causing at least one customer to drop their selections on the floor.

'That's my girl,' he says happily, then turns back to Casey. 'So what are you doing back here? Come to take up your old position as the scariest guy in Burbank? Did Big Mike call you in? Because I gotta tell you, I have Jeff and Lester under control. That thing with the sprinkler system? Never happening again.'

Casey shakes his head. 'Nah, I was in the neighbourhood. You want to get a beer after work, you and Anna? I was going to invite Ellie and Captain Awesome, but they appear to have moved.'

Morgan shakes his head sadly. 'Yeah, they got a house a little further out. They have a daughter now, Caroline, just six months old, can you believe it? I have the number if you want it.'

Casey already has the number, has driven by the house and seen Ellie through the window, feeding her baby, but he nods and says, 'Thanks, I'd appreciate it.'

Morgan dictates it from memory, then spies Big Mike bearing down. 'Gotta go sell stuff. Anna and I get off at six. Tell you what, how about we see you at seven?' He names a bar not too far away, and as Casey grunts, Morgan hurries off to go pester a customer.

Casey shakes Big Mike's hand, agrees when the man tells him he's looking well, and still manages to meet Anna in the home entertainment room to arrange training session times with her. General Beckman looks down from the plasma screen tv on the wall.

'Nice to see you again, Major,' she says, before cutting the connection.

'I always knew there was something more to you, Johnny,' Anna says. 'You'll have to tell me why you were stationed here some time.'

Casey looks at her, his face deadpan, and says, 'I could tell you, but I'd have to kill you.' He waits a beat before adding, 'And Grimes would be a real pain in my ass.'

Anna grins.

Later, in the bar, Casey buys a round. Ellie and Devon have come along too, at Casey's insistence, bringing a sleeping baby with them in a car seat. They have a booth, tucked around a corner in the back. It's as quiet and private as Casey can make it.

'John, how have you been?' Ellie asks, bending to kiss him on the cheek before sliding into the booth beside Anna.

'Good, actually.'

He shakes hands with Devon. It looks as though parenthood is suiting the couple, and he's glad.

'So where did you get to? Morgan said you went travelling, and we never heard from you,' Ellie says.

Casey smiles. 'Actually, I didn't get that far.'

Devon beams. 'You met someone? Awesome!'

'That's going to be Carrie's first word,' Morgan mutters to Anna, who nudges him in the ribs. 'Ow! I was just saying!'

They all laugh at Morgan, then Ellie puts her hand over Casey's. 'So, tell me all about her. What's her name? How did you meet? Is she here?'

Casey leans back. 'About that...' he says, and a slim figure slides into the booth beside him, face partially hidden by a baseball cap.

Chuck takes off the cap and looks around at his family, his friends. He swallows hard. 'Hi,' he whispers, and a long moment passes while they stare at him, amazed.

Ellie cries and punches him in the shoulder, then hugs him so tightly Chuck fears for his ribs. Devon sits back and waits until it becomes clear that Chuck needs a little rescuing, then he puts a hand on Ellie's arm and says, 'Hey, babe, how about you let him tell us what happened.'

Morgan is silent and Anna casts him a worried glance.

At last Chuck can breathe again, but it's a minute before he has his voice under control enough to speak. He leans into Casey for support, and the hand the older man puts on his arm tells everyone that this is the relationship Casey found.

'I can't tell you most of it,' Chuck says, and pauses to sip at a glass of water. 'It has to do with computers and government secrets and it's so highly classified that there actually aren't many people in the country allowed to know about it.'

'Is this because of your job at the Buy More?' Ellie asks, incredulous.

Chuck shakes his head. 'Not really. But I actually did get to save the world, just like Superman.'

Casey looks at him with pride, and that gives him the strength to continue.

'It also put me and all of you in danger, and when that got too much, Casey got me out. Kind of like the witness protection program, only it was for your protection too.'

'But I did CPR and I couldn't save you!' Ellie begins, then stops suddenly, and tears run down her cheeks again. Caroline, sensing her mother's distress, wakes and begins to cry. Devon lifts her out of the car seat to comfort her, and Chuck looks longingly at her.

'Can I - could I hold her, do you think?'

Devon hands her over, and Chuck finds himself gazing into the perfect little face of his neice. She stops crying and stares up at him with eyes as dark as his own.

'She's beautiful,' he breathes, and looks up, flashing a smile that stops Casey's heart for just a second.

'She is,' Devon agrees, and murmurs of assent come from around the table.

Casey takes over. 'I'm sorry, Ellie. I couldn't let you know then, and we can't tell you any more about it now. It would have gotten Chuck and me killed, maybe you and Devon too.'

'And now? What happens now?'

Chuck looks at Casey, who says, 'Meet Pete Kaminsky. My fiance.'

Later, when they're all getting ready to leave the bar, Chuck stops Morgan. 'I'm so, so sorry, buddy. You have no idea how much I wanted to be able to tell you.'

Morgan nods. 'You were James Bond, I get it.'

Chuck laughs. 'Less Bond than the guy Bond has to rescue.' He puts a hand on Morgan's shoulder. 'Are you okay?'

Morgan forces a smile, which turns into a real one. 'Yeah, yeah I am. My best friend just came back from the dead. How could I not be okay with that?' He wraps his arms around Chuck, hugging away the pain of the last two years.

Looking up, he asks, 'So are you happy? Really? With John Casey, who is apparently far scarier than we all thought?'

Chuck nods. 'Yeah, I am.'

Ellie kisses John on the cheek again as she leaves. 'Thank you,' she whispers. 'Thank you for saving my little brother. Take good care of him, John.'

Casey nods, understanding that she may never forgive him for the pain he's caused, but she can live with it because now her brother is here, alive and well and happy. He hugs her and whispers back, 'I'll always be here to catch him when he falls.'


End file.
